A Brother came up to me last night at Lodge Vitruvian's Festive Board with a copy of "Ritual of the Modern Order of the Essenes" by M. Wolcott Redding, which he was amazed that he could read, and wanted to know who the 'Modern Order of the Essesnes' were. I've been asked this question several times over the years. This was an exposure or ritual aid of the Masonic ritual, first published in 1870, and contains the words of the degrees in plain English, with mysterious symbols for key words and actions, like rapping the gavel, knocks, etc. It was published under that name to hide it from the public and avoid criticism by the Masons themselves.
Masonic exposures have been around almost since the beginning of the Premiere Grand Lodge in England in 1717. If they were published out of spite or a desire to weaken the fraternity, it would have happened a long time ago, instead of growing to five million brethren the world over. Most of these books became popular from Masons themselves buying them to help them learn the ritual, and not from a herd of curious onlookers or anti-Masons storming the doors of lodges pretending to be Masons from something they read in an exposure.
For a list of the many exposures published over the years, Gary Dryfoos has it on his website, "A Page About Freemasonry. Click here to see it.
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UPDATE: I got this message from Jeff Croteau at the Scottish Rite NMJ Museum about disguised ciphers:
Masonic exposures have been around almost since the beginning of the Premiere Grand Lodge in England in 1717. If they were published out of spite or a desire to weaken the fraternity, it would have happened a long time ago, instead of growing to five million brethren the world over. Most of these books became popular from Masons themselves buying them to help them learn the ritual, and not from a herd of curious onlookers or anti-Masons storming the doors of lodges pretending to be Masons from something they read in an exposure.
For a list of the many exposures published over the years, Gary Dryfoos has it on his website, "A Page About Freemasonry. Click here to see it.
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UPDATE: I got this message from Jeff Croteau at the Scottish Rite NMJ Museum about disguised ciphers:
Chris,
Nice post on the Essenes ciphers. Some of these ciphers had hilariously and intentionally misleading title pages. I’ve written about three of them on the Scottish Rite Masonic Museum & Library’s blog. I include links here in case they’re of interest:
I hope all’s well.
Best,
Jeff
Jeff
Jeffrey Croteau
Manager of Library & Archives
Scottish Rite Masonic Museum and Library
Manager of Library & Archives
Scottish Rite Masonic Museum and Library
33 Marrett Road | Lexington, MA 02421